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She wokerested as much because of that familial communion, provided by her subconscious as because of the sleep itself Sunlight from a cloudless sky sparkled on the car’s chroh the rearChris was still dozing In the back seat the wounded ained consciousness

She risked a quick walk to a telephone booth beside the e she had in her purse, she called Ida Palomar, Chris’s tutor in Lake Arrowhead, to tell her they would be away from home the rest of the week She did want poor Ida to walk unsuspecting into the bullet-riddled, blood-spattered house near Big Bear, where police forensic teams were no doubt hard at work She did not tell Ida where she was calling from; nevertheless, she did not intend to reer

After she returned to the car, she sat yawning, stretching, andthe back of her neck, as she watched early shoppers entering and leaving the superry With sleep-matted eyes and sour breath, Chris woke less than ten o into the e juice, not the

"What about hiuardian

She re about the patient’s risk of dehydration But she also knew that she could not force-feed him liquids when he was co a third orange juice Maybe I can coax hiht as well get us so that won’t spoil-say a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter And get a can of spray deodorant and a bottle of sharinned "Why won’t you let ood nutrition, you’re going to wind up with a brain even ot now, kiddo"

"Even on the lam from hired killer:;, I’etables, and a bottle of vitaet? Coo"

He started to close his door

She said, "And, Chris" "I know," the boy said "Be careful" While Chris was gone, she started the engine and switched on the radio to listen to the nine o’clock news She heard a story about herself: the scene at her house near Big Bear, the shoot-out in San Bernardino Like most news stories it was inaccurate, disjointed, and made little sense But it confirhout southern California According to the reporter, the authorities expected to locate her soon, largely because her face was already widely known

She had been shocked last night when Carter Brenkshaw recognized her as Laura Shane, famous writer She did not think of herself as a celebrity; she was only a storyteller, a weaver of tales, orked with a loo a special fabric from words She had done only one book tour for an early novel, had loathed that dreary trek, and had not repeated the experience She was not a regular guest on television talkshows She had never endorsed a product in a TV coone public in support of a politician, and had in general atte part of thea dust jacket photograph on her books because it seee of thirty-three she could admit without severe e woined, as the police put it, that her face idely known

Now she was dismayed not only because her loss of anonymity made her easier quarry for the police but because she knew that beco a celebrity in modern America was tantamount to a loss of one’s self-critical faculties and a severe decline of artistic power A few ures and hile writers, but most seemed to be corrupted by the media attention Laura dreaded that trap al picked up by the police

Suddenly, with some surprise, she realized that if she could worry about beco her artistic center, she must still believe in a safe future in which she would write ht to the death, to struggle to a bloody end to protect her son, but throughout she had felt that their situation was virtually hopeless, their ene had changed her, had brought her around to a diuarded optimise package of pecan-cinnae juice, and the other ite had ever tasted better

When she finished her own breakfast, Laura got in the back seat and tried to wake her guardian He could not be roused

She gave the third carton of orange juice to Chris and said, Keep it for him He’ll probably wake up soon"

"If he can’t drink, he can’t take his penicillin," Chris said

"He doesn’t need to take any for a few hours yet Dr Brenkshae hi"

But Laura orried If he did not regain consciousness, they erous ht never find a way out of it "What next?" Chris asked

"We’ll find a service station, use the rest rooms, then stop at a op and buy ammunition for the Uzi and the revolver Afterwe start looking for a ht kind of motel, a where we can hide out"

When they settled in somewhere, they would be at least fifty miles from Dr Brenkshaw’s place, where their enemies had last found them But did distance matter to men who measured their journeys strictly in days and years rather than hborhoods on the south side of Anaheireatest nu She did not want aRed Lion Inn or Howard Johnson’s Motor Lodge with color television sets, deep-pile carpet, and a heated swi pool because reputable establishments required valid ID and aa paper trail that would bring either the police or the assassins down on her Instead she was seeking a h repair to attract tourists, a seedy place where they were sappy to get the business, eager to take cash, and reluctant to ask questions that would drive away guests

She knew she would have a hard ti a room, and she was not surprised to discover that the first twelve places she tried were unable or unwilling to acco fro Mexican wo children in tow, and young or ed Mexican ht deni straboy hats and some baseball caps, and all of them with an air of watchfulness and suspicion Most decrepit rants, hundreds of thousands of whoe County alone Whole fale room, five or six or seven of the one ancient bed and two chairs and a bathroo, for which they paid a hundred and fifty dollars or more every week, with no linen or maid service or amenities of any kind, but with cockroaches by the thousands Yet they illing to endure those conditions and let theeously exploited as underpaid workers rather than return to their homeland and live under the rule of the "revolutionary people’s governiven them no brotherhood but that of despair

At the thirteenth er still hoped to serve the lower end of the tourist trade, and he had not yet succu frorants A few of the twenty-four units were obviously rented to illegals, but the ement still provided fresh linen daily, maid service, television sets, and two spare pillows in every closet However the fact that the desk clerk took cash, did not press her for ID, and avoidedher eyes was sad proof that in another year The Bluebird of Happiness would be one more monument to political stupidity and human avarice in a world as croith such monuments as any old, city ces in a U-shape, with parking in the ht rear corner of the back wing A big fan palm flourished near the door to their roo or liround rowth even in winter, as if nature had chosen it as a subtle oain when humankind passed on

Laura and Chris unfolded the wheelchair and got the wounded , as if they were si for a disabled person Fully dressed, with his wounds concealed, her guardian could pass for a paraplegic - except for the way his head lolled against his shoulder

Their rooh passably clean The carpet orn but recently shampooed, and a pair of dustballs in one corner the size of tumbleweeds The maroon-plaid spread on the queen size bed was tattered at the edges, and its pattern was not quite busy enough to conceal two patches, but the sheets were crisp and suardian from the wheelchair to the bed and put two pillows under his head

The seventeen-inch television set was firmly bolted to a table with a scarred, las of the table were in turn bolted to the floor Chris sat in one of the two mismatched chairs, switched on the set, and turned the cracked dial in search of either a cartoon show or reruns of an old sitcom He settled for Get Smart, but complained that it was "too stupid to be funny," and wondered how ht so